Kent here explores Fornes' early development as a playwright.

In the following essay, Murray presents a critical discussion on the themes of female friendship and female desire in Fefu and Her Friends.

An interview with Maria Irene Fornes, in In Their Own Words: Contemporary American Playwrights, by David Savran, Theatre Communications Group, 1988, pp. 51-69. In the conversation below, Fornes and Savran talk about a number of issues relating to Fornes' dramas, including influences on her work, the content of her plays, and the political role of theater.

In the following essay, Koppen compares and contrasts the formal and aesthetic qualities of the dramatic works of Fornes and Gertrude Stein.

In the following essay, Worthen explores "the operation of the mise-en-scéne on the process of dramatic action" in Fornes' plays.

In this essay, Zinman detects elements of the theater of the absurd in several of Fornes' plays.

In the essay below, Moroff investigates "the theatrical palimpsest in Fornes's theater, the simultaneous literary and visual texts that are theater."

In the following essay, Wolf argues that the form, as well as the content, of Fornes's plays make possible a feminist interpretation of the violence that pervades much of her work. Wolf asserts that Fornes's plays “re-present violence in order to point to its gendered construction.”

In the following essay, Farfan analyzes the feminist elements of Fefu and Her Friends, asserting that Fefu “posits postmodern feminist theatre practice as a constructive response to the psychic dilemmas of the play's female characters.”

In the following essay, Farfan maintains that, for Fornes, there exists an "organic relationship" between the writing and the directing of her plays.

In the following essay, Porterfield discusses Fornes's theatrical technique and her work as a director of her own plays. Porterfield argues that Fornes's dominant thematic focus is “the search for truth, for wholeness, for understanding of our attempts to make sense out of a seemingly random existence.”

In the following essay, Kiebuzinska discusses the influence of playwright and dramatist Bertolt Brecht on the feminist elements of Mud.

In the following essay, O'Malley explores Fornes's representation of women's attitudes toward housework in Fefu and Her Friends, Mud, and The Conduct of Life, concluding that Fornes views housekeeping as a positive, ritualized act of “self-knowledge and love.”

In the following essay, Gargano comments that Fornes's theatrical technique in Mud is analogous to ground-breaking developments in scientific theory. Gargano asserts that Fornes “uses the paradigm of the theatre as potential to demonstrate the inevitable connection between our art, our learning, and our social artifice.”

In the following essay, Rabillard argues that Fornes's plays combine postmodern techniques of distancing the audience with dramatic scenes of emotional transcendence.

In this essay, Austin examines Fornes' "use of the madwoman figure and the image of confinement on stage. "

In the following essay, Cummings critiques a 1992 Magic Theatre production of Oscar and Bertha, noting that Fornes's works “present some of the most poignant and painful aspects of being human in an abstract, almost pure, form.”

In the following interview, originally conducted on May 23, 1985, Fornes discusses the development of her career as a director and playwright, as well as the stylistic elements of her plays.

In the following, Fornes discusses her writing methods.

In the following essay, Drukman critiques the unique stylistic qualities of Fornes's plays, which make them both critically acclaimed and difficult to analyze.

In the following essay, Marranca observes that Fornes's plays explore the spiritual lives of women and the consequences of their various life-choices.

In the following essay, Marranea describes the essential characteristics of Fornes' drama, praising the "warm delicacy and grace that distinguish it from most of what is written today."

In the following, which was first published in 1981, Pevitts reads Fefu and Her Friends as a feminist play.

In the following essay, Sontag extols Fornes' growth as a dramatist. "The plays, " she states, "have always been about wisdom: what it means to be wise. They are getting wiser. "

In the following review, Rabillard praises a 1993 New City Theater production of Enter the Night, asserting that the central theme of the play is the characters' desire to “ease one another's pain.”

In the following essay, Shewey discusses the New York Signature Theatre Company's retrospective series on Fornes's plays, commenting that the playwright is “one of the best-kept secrets of the American theater.”